What's up with the Iran deal?

The U.S. and Iran signed a deal to extend a ceasefire. It’s meant to mark the beginning of the end of the war that President Donald Trump began four months ago. Days before the ink was dry, Trump already threatened to drop more bombs on Iran. The war has killed over 7,000 people. A vast majority of the killings have happened in Iran and Lebanon. Last month, a Pentagon official told lawmakers the war had cost the U.S. $29 billion. We’ll probably see lasting economic impacts, including higher gas and grocery prices, after the end of the war.

The details of the agreement are finally public, although U.S. officials urged us to not care about the fine print behind how they plan to stop the deaths of thousands, injuries of thousands more, and widespread economic impacts on all our lives. But at least Trump says the Strait of Hormuz is reopened, after it closed because of the war he started, even though experts who track ship movements say it’s not quite as open as Trump says it is.

The U.S. and Israel also killed Iran’s head of state at the start of the war, then the Ayatollah’s son replaced him. NPR reported that his appointment “signals a continuation” of his father’s rule. In other words, U.S. efforts at regime change in Iran largely failed — not that history shows the world would be better off had they succeeded. And the U.S. failed in another goal of this war: stopping nuclear development in Iran. To be clear, there is no evidence that Iran came close to having a nuclear bomb. But the agreement doesn’t leave much room to negotiate on Iran’s nuclear program.

Israel, which started this war in February alongside the U.S., is not part of this deal. But Iranian officials say the deal would require Israeli forces to get out of Lebanon, where the public health ministry says 3,700 people have been killed since Israel renewed its attacks there in March. Amnesty International says Israel has committed war crimes in Lebanon, in addition to its ongoing genocide in Gaza. Israel has previously refused to withdraw from Lebanon.

That’s how much one company paid when they didn’t limit how much their employees could use Claude, according to an AI consultant who talked to Axios. We don’t know the name of said company, but we do know something similar is happening in other workplaces. Microsoft discontinued its Claude Code license, and by April, Uber burned through all the money it had budgeted for Claude.

Meanwhile, Google made Gemini, its AI service, cheaper. The lowest subscription tier is now 40% less expensive than it previously was. And before this starts reading like a Gemini ad, let me point out what this price drop shows us about the instability of the AI industry. OpenAI is losing money, and I’m no businessman, but that seems like it would make it harder to drop prices in order to match a competitor.

Why care, even if you (like me) aren’t using generative AI tools? Given how much of the stock market these companies control at the moment, their financial instability could have profound impacts on our ability to retire.

Ivanka Trump, the president’s daughter, said on a podcast that she’s opening a five-star resort on Sazan Island in Albania. She tells the story of how she “found” it while riding on a friend’s boat as though she discovered it herself, which has drawn pushback from protesters.

Sazan Island was public land. But in the last few years, Trump and Kushner have taken ownership of part of the island. Kushner posted renderings of what the resort would look like back in 2024, the same year Albania’s prime minister championed a law that allowed for five-star hotels on public land. Before that, land like Sazan Island was protected.

It’s also the middle of breeding season for at least 250 bird species on the island, including flamingos. Protesters in Albania have pointed to the ecological destruction this development could cause. Security physically dragged one protester away from a demonstration. That sparked more protests in a movement that is now being called “the Flamingo Revolution.”

Environmental organizations have pointed out that selling protected land violates European Union rules. Albania is an official candidate for EU membership, so it’s subject to those rules.

That brings us to this week’s media literacy tip from our friends at MediaWise! Here’s how to navigate the rush of information that can happen around protests.

The New York Times reports that tech companies are hyping up new tools to help students get around AI-detectors, making it harder to figure out when students use AI to cheat. Not to sound like a cop who wants to make students’ lives harder, but research has shown that AI in education can hinder critical development for kids and teens.

This flurry of promotion for tools that get around AI detectors also comes at a moment when educational institutions are spending tons of money on AI detection tools that are becoming more and more ineffective. And the tech companies that make those tools are cashing in big time. The Times also reports that those same companies are also making money on these tools that make it harder to detect AI use.

College students in the U.S. are using AI a lot. Research shows that two-thirds of undergrads use it, and more than 90 percent of them are worried that it’s leading them to turn in plagiarized or dishonest work.

On a federal, state, and local level, public data can help explain a bunch of issues you may care about: the economy, healthcare, education, housing and more.

For instance, the Bureau of Labor Statistics collects all sorts of data to track things like inflation and unemployment. Data on things like the fastest growing occupations can help you make decisions in your everyday life, like what field to pursue.

USAFacts, a not-for-profit, nonpartisan civic initiative focused on data accessibility, sponsored the video I’m summarizing right now. They’re also collecting signatures for an open letter to Congress. They’re asking Congress to use data “to define problems, compare options, allocate resources, and measure outcomes.” They’re also demanding fixes to “years of underinvestment… in America’s data system,” which is often outdated and slow moving. You can sign the petition here.